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In my few years of this hobby I have mainly played with my Blood Angels.
And even tough I like them I have been trying to find a second army for a while and it just doesn't seem to work.
For some reason I have only managed to gather small groups of other Space Marines (SW and DA, roughly 1000 points of each).
Because I have so few of them I never field them as a whole army. And since even with all their toys they are still Space Marines I have hardly put any money/time for them, just a few units to paint.

But seriously, I would love to have some diversity to play with in bigger games. Now unless we are playing at 500 or something similar, I am almost forced to use Blood Angels.
But even tough I would want a new army, it just never seems to work with me. I've played Eldar until I sold them. I have also tried my friend's Orks and actually liked but I am not sure if I want to start them as it's enormous amount of work and money.

So two questions for you: first, have any of you struggled with the same inefficency in starting new army? What should I do?

And second, what army would you recommend to me? All you need to know is that I already have a close combat army and that competitiveness is not that important.

Should I continue with Imperium? Try Chaos? Go with the xenos? I'm open to all ideas.

Thanks in advance!!

If you're problem is "I'm bored painting space Marines" I'd caution you against chaos Marines. while they have a fair bit of varity you're still going to be effectivly painting a lot of Marines.

If you're staying with the Imperium I'd suggest Imperial guard, but they're a pretty high model count army so will take a LOT of time and money.

If you just wanna get your army built fast, so you can play, Grey Knights might be an idea, they're pretty low model count, they are marines but so far I'm finding them sufficantly differnt from vanilla marines due to the totally differnt armor

Buy some space wolves and about 10 drop pods enjoy. Welcome to 7th.

Why not go with another Imperial army so you can use them as an allied detachment? That way you can play larger battles with your BA and with something else. Get a small AM/MT army maybe, representing some backwater Imperial world that your Blood Angels have been deployed to for some reason.

Can the Assassins be taken as a stand alone army? If so, I'd do that. There's also Forgeworld IG. Both have unique play styles. it's expensive but i'v had a good time painting my DKoK.

I vote Adeptus Mechanicus:

Pros:
Very small, very very very durable army. Last game I had seven units at 2,000 points and lost one of them.

Very large variety - one unit (Adsecularis Convent) are worse even than guardsmen, and are troops, swinging all the way to the Castellax Automaton, a T7 monstrous creature, as troops. HQ can range from worse than a marine chaplain to practically a hive tyrant. There's quite a bit of variety in the list, both in models and in rules.

Great at both shooting and assualt - Myrmidon Destructors, the heavy support Devastator analogues, come with a powerfist and a heavy weapon, and are tougher than Terminators. EDIT: And are Relentless

Excellent models.

Lots of synergy, from the data-djinn wireless network to cybertheurgical augmentation of combat automatons by the Legio Cybernetica magi.

Cons:

Very, very slow - many units (like the aforementioned Myrmidons) cannot run or sweeping advance. No fast vehicles. Jetpack infantry are prolific (Thallax Cohorts, as a troops choice), but tend to be less tough than their monstrous-creature or fearless-blob counterparts.

Very very dense - such packed-in combat power means that the balance between board control and force concentration is skewed heavily towards dense force concentration, and that is not always a good thing.

Very very expensive - awesome models, but incredible prices (sadly).

I'd get an Imperial Knight. I don't own one, but they seem pretty effective, and it's only one model to paint and adds about 400 points to any army you choose. Nice and simple.

Imperial Guard is a nice complement to Space Marines and an Imperial Knight. If you want low model count, stick with Vets and transports (Chimeras, Tauroxes, or Valkyries). Even better, go with a FW Elysians D-99 list, buy a squad at a time, paint it. Then buy a Valk, paint it. Then buy a Vulture, paint it. Rinse and repeat until you have a fully air-mobile Imperial Guard army!

Necrons, because fistbumb!
After years of Blood Angels I also wanted a ranged army, something non-Imperium.
And now I have a bigger collection of Necrons than Blood Angels, but I'm going to change that when our Codex hits.

Play Dark Eldar if you like the idea of bottling the essence of anguished Space Marine players, chilling and carbonating it, drinking it, and having your belches sound like the screaming of terrified children because you destroy their armies, sodomize their special characters, and melt their vehicles into jagged spikes that flense the flesh off of their inferior armies one excruciating poke at a time.


*edit* Hello Dakka. I return.

Definitely Dark Eldar! Lots of fun, lots of spikes, and I'm sadly parting with an army (link in my sig) due to monetary constraints so you can get a sweet deal.

They're definitely better at shooty than stubby, though they ain't no slouches in CC if that's the way you'd like to go either. Lots of new toys for you to play with, endless variation and great internal balance in the codex, wicked awesome models, fun to paint, PLUS you'll get to play both the old codex for a while (which rocks) and the new codex once it comes out within the next year!

SPACE WOLVES for sheer fluff alone.
-They're vikings from space!
-They are so rugged, they might have killed two founding legions that needed purging. Because the Emperor says so!
-They're like the A-Team of 40k!
-They refer to war as a "Murder-make"
For the Crunch?
-The entire army has Counter Attack!
-Men riding giant wolves!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And don't forget about the MOST FAMOUS SPACE WOLF!!!

-SLY MARBO!

Go with Orks
There's nothing like screaming WAAGH as your tide of green runs into close combat. As long as you don't mind painting green, go with orks.

Astra militarium-

got a problem? throw men at it.

still a problem? throw more men at it.

they all died again? fine, send in the armored division. *watch as enemy gets ground to mulch under lumbering behemoth tanks*

ok, now send in the vets to clean up!

but- Am (or IG for most) are my favorite army, I didn't get them because 1. I can't paint, much less paint the faces and shadows of cloth.

but they can run almost any army you want!

aircav? cool

mech? got

boots on ground? almost better than ork hordes!

mixed? works wonders with vets.

also... you can get about 90 blast/templates in one shooting phase at 2k points with guards.

Are you into modeling and kitbashing? I can highly recommend starting a chaos army of CSMs and renegade guard. They offer a lot of room for doing whatever you like. Mixing in WHFB beastmen or vic minis beastmen, WGF greatcoats, heaps of stuff can make for a great looking renegade guard. Both armies can make great use of green stuff deformities and random bits from other ranges such as skeletal hands, ogre arms, whatever. Makes for a really nice themed force fluffwise too imo.

Perhaps a new army playstyle would suit you better. Cron silver tide appealing? Cron air? IG armour wall? IG platoon spam? IG air cav? Drop pod marines? Low model count elite model army with termies and land raiders? What tickles your fancy overall? ; )

Thanks for the suggestions!

As I said, I would like to stay away from Marines and I already own a Space Wolf army that runs with three Drop Pods.

Some of your ideas seem really cool!

Imperial Guard. Yeah, the high model count bothers me but I think I could consider an army with some Guardsmen, couple of tanks and Tempestus.
The only problem is that two of my friends are already running a MT project

Adeptus Mechanicum sounds awesome! I just didn't know they had a codex D:
Might look that up.

Of Xeno races both DE and Necron seem nice. The shooting theme seems great compared to my BA.

Once again, thanks! I will see what I can do.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So... It would seem that there is a codex for Adeptus Mechanicum, but isn't it 30k only?

 Pyeatt wrote:
SPACE WOLVES for sheer fluff alone.
-They're vikings from space!
-They are so rugged, they might have killed two founding legions that needed purging. Because the Emperor says so!
-They're like the A-Team of 40k!
-They refer to war as a "Murder-make"
For the Crunch?
-The entire army has Counter Attack!
-Men riding giant wolves!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And don't forget about the MOST FAMOUS SPACE WOLF!!!

-SLY MARBO!

I vote against Space Wolves.
They're utter bastards who slaughtered at least one innocent legion who trusted them as brothers.
I actually foster quite a hate for them - for what they did to the Thousand Sons.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Buuuuuut I'm de-railing the thread there, so I'll return for the sake of the OP.

If you want a shooty xeno and like the idea of DE or Necrons, I'd recommend DE.
I have Necrons myself, but want to start a DE force for a few reasons:
1. They're a lot rarer
2. Poisoned fun!
3. Requires a lot of skill
4. You never play objectives

Update:
Asked my friend about this and he said that he could sell me his Sisters of Battle!

Couple of Rhino's 20-something Sisters and Uriah Jacobus (+ a single Priest).
80 euros, codex included. What do you think?

Excellent deal. Take it. TAKE IT!

The Sisters are an incredible army, capable of punching far above their weight class. The smaller the game, the more powerful they are.

Their abilities are interesting, the models are very nice, for all that they're from 1998 (for the most part) and they have some very nice tanks.

As if that wasn't enough to sway you, for twenty Sisters, Jacobus and a couple of Rhinos, you're normally looking at nearly 200 euros - assuming that they all have bolters.

That's a good size for an allies contingent, and depending on special weapons, you can build a small army as well - Sisters infantry squads go from five models to twenty in size, so they scale quite well.

I would go xenos. Tau, necrons or DE specifically. They will offer you what you've been missing. Even tyranids would be different too. I'm in your boat right now in that I have 1500 points of Space Wolves, 1000+ of Blood Angels, Dark Angels and Chaos. I've been trying to pick a xenos to go with, but I can't decide

Sisters of Battle, aka. Marines with breasts... Frankly, if you want away from Marines, stop looking at power armor. Don't even glance at 3+ saves and look for something more numerous and more varied. Elysian Drop Troops for example. Light armor, light vehicles, high mobility and sudden strikes. Coupling that with a small detachment of your Blood Angels can give you a very good and dynamic game in any narrative campaign and you still have the weight of the Imperial Guard as you get more units.

Definitely take the Sisters deal; too good to pass up. Sisters are a short-range, shooty army with limited assault ability, so they will play much differently than your BAs. But, I would still vote for an elite IG detachment or, if going xenos, a Dark Eldar force. The Dark Eldar models are some of the best sculpts in 40K, IMO. I would also make the extra effort to find the metal versions of their HQs on eBay, rather than those awful Finecast ports on the GW site.

Necrons. They paint different than SM and they play different. Plus, unlike Blood angels, you may win every now and then.

DE. Best looking models, variety of playstyles, possibility of a new codex in the near future, and tons of kitbash options.

Well, I decided to buy those Sisters because as pointed out, they were pretty cheap. I knew that Sisters were expensive but I just didn't realise that they were almost 8$ a piece!

So for a while I think I will be focusing on them, aiming for an army of 1000-1500, depending on how I like playing them.

I still think that a single non-Imperial faction would be worth the shot and I'm a bit torn between Necrons and Dark Eldar (altough Traitor Guard seems like an interesting idea as well).
As both of them will be getting new codices within months, I think the decision can wait.

Thanks for the opinions & help everyone!!

Adeptus Mechanicus are practically non-Imperial. Their codex is from the Age of Darkness (30k) from Forge World, but everyone I know across four states is willing to play them against 40k armies. Given the shennanigans of 7th Edition's force organizations, playing a 30k list isn't as bad as it used to be.

I would like to second the mechanicus without any experience only because it's cool.

but other than that, I would say Orks. I'm having a blast with them and the best part is using spare bits from my collection and others to spice them up a bit. A shoulder pad here, a helmet there, ect. I even have one ork with a bolter and storm bolter taped to eachother to represent a TL shoota!

 SharkoutofWata wrote:
Sisters of Battle, aka. Marines with breasts... Frankly, if you want away from Marines, stop looking at power armor. Don't even glance at 3+ saves and look for something more numerous and more varied. Elysian Drop Troops for example. Light armor, light vehicles, high mobility and sudden strikes. Coupling that with a small detachment of your Blood Angels can give you a very good and dynamic game in any narrative campaign and you still have the weight of the Imperial Guard as you get more units.

Thus spake someone who has never actually played or faced a Sisters army.

Tyranids.

 Dashofpepper wrote:
*edit* Hello Dakka. I return.

Yeah because we really need another fluff bunny.